Barclays boss Antony Jenkins, parachuted in to fix the damage left by the Libor bomb, is still shell-shocked.

“I do occasionally find it strange when someone introduces me as the CEO of Barclays,” Jenkins has disclosed on the eve of his turnaround plan for the bank, rumoured to involve 2,000 job losses.

Reassuring. As is the leader's view that any of his 140,000 staff who “won’t want to work in the new way [of ethical banking]” can get lost. “That’s fine,” remarks Jenkins in a candid magazine interview. “But those people really have to go and work somewhere else.”

This is the executive, Diary recalls, who came up with his rescue plan for Barclays by studying zoos with disgraced boss Bob Diamond’s underling Rich Ricci. “We did a lot of considering,” Ricci told the Commission on Banking Standards on the pair's research.

In other words, Barclays’ new banking system has been modelled on the antics of primates and other animals. Monkey business, some might say.

The US budget deal has pushed Congress over the popularity cliff. Diary thanks Public Policy Polling for its illuminating new study, conducted after last week’s fiscal bailout, which reveals that the US electorate prefers cockroaches to Congress. The 830 Americans canvassed also rate the law-maker lower than lice, traffic jams, Donald Trump, Ghengis Khan, used-car dealers and – to add insult to injury – France. How the mighty have fallen.

Shell hoping to avoid double

On the subject of unpopular institutions, Goldman Sachs and Royal Dutch “no leak from the Kulluk” Shell are leading a poll to name the worst company of the year.

This is quite some achievement, since the other miscreants on the Public Eye Awards shortlist include the miner Lonmin, of South African riots fame, and Olympic wooden spoon winner G4S.

Can Shell, a winner in 2005, do the double when the results come out later this month to coincide with Davos? The summit, to recap, where Shell chief Peter Voser last year said he was “hopeful” for his company’s now-shaky Arctic exploration prospects.

On ice, as Diary likes to say.

Purple patch for Pink 'Un editor

Meanwhile, one-time Financial Times editor Andrew Gowers is also on a winning streak. After editing the Pink ‘Un, where he soapboxed the merits of Britain joining the euro, Gowers managed comms for the late Lehman Brothers and BP in its Gulf of Mexico oil spill era.

Now it emerges he has been hired to look after reputation, government relations and health and safety for Trafigura, the commodities trader with a track record of dumping toxic waste and allegedly bribing Zambian officials. “There’s lots to do,” deadpans Gowers.

Time for Change at HMRC

It's been all quiet on the HMRC front ever since the tax bureau announced it was looking for a new comms director last November. So Diary thought it was time for an update on how the hunt for that reputation supremo on a generous salary of £120k is coming along.

Interviews will take place from January 21, confirmed HMRC – although it declined to say how many people have applied for the opportunity, which involves managing the troubled department’s Change programme.

As the last person to hold the post on a full-time basis, Simon MacDowell, said on retiring in August 2011 after 12 years on the job: “You reach a point when you say ‘I think that’s long enough.’”